Tuesday, November 03, 2009

DTN News: Guinea's Military Junta Imports Arms Despite Embargo• Sanctions were imposed after stadium massacre
• President fearful of fresh coup, say military sources*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) CONAKRY, Guinea - November 4, 2009: Guinea's military junta has imported millions of dollars worth of weapons in recent weeks, despite international sanctions imposed on the country after members of the presidential guard massacred at least 160 people at an opposition rally in September.
Light arms worth $45m (£27m) were flown into the country on 23 October in defiance of the embargo, according to local and diplomatic sources in the capital, Conakry.
Soldiers on patrol in Conakry, where tensions remain high after at least 160 people were killed in September during a political rally.
Sources suggest the weapons were bought in Ukraine by the defence minister, Sékouba Konaté, during a recent private visit, and their arrival was supervised by a specially hired group of South African security advisers.
The South African newspaper Beeld alleges that as many as 50 mercenaries could be in Guinea working for the government and the president, Captain Moussa "Dadis" Camarra, who seized power after a coup last December.
The atmosphere in Conakry is increasingly tense. Last week a city-wide strike was called. Most shops and banks closed to mark one month since the violent suppression of an anti-government rally at the national football stadium. Local human rights workers believe scores were killed when government soldiers, led by members of the presidential guard, opened fire on pro-democracy demonstrators at a stadium on 28 September.
Dozens of women were raped in a co-ordinated attack by the military, which prompted international outrage. A series of sanctions followed, including a freeze on assets and travel bans against the leaders of the junta.
Dadis disputes the number of dead, blaming rogue military elements for the violence, which he claims was provoked by the opposition. But he now appears to be an isolated figure, cancelling his weekly television appearances and refusing requests for media interviews. This may in part be due to a recent intimate profile by the French television channel France 24, in which Dadis was filmed in his pyjamas in the presidential bed. He shows the reporter his preferred bedtime reading, a book entitled The Power of Positive Thinking. French media have since been ejected from the country.
Dadis is now rarely seen on the streets. Sources in the military say he is becoming fearful of a counter-coup from within his own military. He is not alone. The chief of presidential security, Claude Pivi, who is believed to have personally supervised the September attack, now drives through town escorted by no fewer than seven battle wagons with anti-aircraft guns strapped to the back.
In the 50 years since it won independence from France, Guinea has never known a freely elected government. Analysts say the main fear of the junta is not unrest among the public, but a split within the military. To shore up support, Dadis has begun recruiting militia units from among his own Forestier ethnic group in the east of the country. He has promoted fellow Forestiers to senior positions in preference to those from other tribes.
The international political pressure is also testing nerves. Dadis has pledged to allow a team of UN investigators into the country, saying those responsible for the September massacre will face punishment. Some officers are said to fear that they will be made scapegoats.
"The army is deeply divided," said Corinne Dufka, of Human Rights Watch. "Members of other tribal groupings within the military feel marginalised and many soldiers have personally told me they are horrified by the massacre, which they say was the work of a small minority."
Members of the opposition coalition meanwhile continue to face the threat of arrest and violent assault. While leaders of the Forces Vives have agreed to participate in West African-led negotiations with the military junta, many still operate either from abroad or in hiding.
Britain, the US and France, as well as west African nations, are calling on Dadis to stand down. Presidential elections are due to be held in January. Dadis has so far refused to honour his pledge not to run.
The fear is that further conflict in Guinea could again spill over into neighbouring Liberia and Sierra Leone, which have only recently emerged from years of violent conflict. There are unconfirmed reports of former Liberian combatants joining Dadis's militias.
Mouctar Diallo, one of the leading opposition leaders, called on the foreign powers to rescue the country from Dadis. "We are asking the international community to help us to dismantle his ethnic militias," he said. "The people of Guinea are in danger. We have the right and a duty to demand a humanitarian intervention."

DTN News: Russia's Economic Crisis And U.S.-Russia Relations ~ Troubled Times Ahead
*Source: The Heritage Foundation by Ariel Cohen, Ph.D. and Richard E. Ericson, Ph. D. Backgrounder #2333
*Abstract: Russia's revenues from oil and natural gas are enabling its aggressive and often anti-Western foreign policy. Russia's falling economic performance has toned down Russia's rhetoric, but has not drastically changed Russia's foreign policy narrative, which remains decidedly anti- status quo and implicitly anti-American. The U.S. needs to devise incentives for steps that facilitate Russia's integration into global markets, but deny benefits if Russia continues to pursue anti-American policies or refuses to enact the needed changes.
(NSI News Source Info) KOTTAKKAL, Kerala, India - November 4, 2009: As the Obama Administration embarks on a major readjustment of U.S. policy toward Russia,[1] U.S. policymakers need to understand how the economic crisis is influencing Russia's foreign and domestic policies, and thereby affects U.S. interests. Much of Russia's assertiveness and adventurism in recent years floated on a bubble of expensive oil and natural gas exports. Today, however, the Russian elite appears to be divided between those who hope that natural resources will continue to finance Russia's assertive foreign policy, and those, like President Dmitry Medvedev, who are calling for a major reform to clean up corruption, strengthen the court system, and move away from the current resource-export model toward a knowledge-based economy that is integrated into the global economy.Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev attends a session of the presidential commission for modernisation and technological advancement of the Russian economy in the town of Fryazino outside Moscow, October 28, 2009.
The Obama Administration's strategy of unilateral U.S. concessions may fail. Instead, the U.S. should pursue a strategy based on a realistic assessment of Russian economic power. The White House should deny Russia economic benefits if it pursues anti-American policies. Meanwhile, the U.S. should work with its European allies to diversify their natural gas supplies, to defeat Russian hopes of blackmailing Europe into further strategic concessions, to block Russian weapons and sales to Iran and Venezuela, and to oppose Russia's attempt to reestablish its hegemony in the "near abroad." Finally, the Administration should focus U.S.-Russian strategic and economic cooperation on matters in which pursuit of mutual interests is possible.
The Russian Economic Crisis and Its Aftermath
Since the summer of 2008, the Russian economy has undergone a major economic meltdown, largely due to the global financial crisis. The crisis caused a significant decline in oil and gas revenues, the principal source of income for the Russian economy and the government.
Beginning in the fall of 2008, the financial resources for Russia's assertive foreign and defense policy dwindled, with Russia's massive hard currency reserves declining from about $600 billion to about $400 billion. However, economic growth resumed in the second quarter of 2009 before the reserves were exhausted.
Russia has been an important U.S. foreign policy priority since World War II. For decades, the U.S. has strived to bring Russia into the international system as a predictable and constructive partner. While progress in international security has been slow and difficult, as shown by the August 2008 war in Georgia and Russian intransigence on Iran, the prospects of progress in business and economics appears more promising.
Despite the downturn, Russia has pocketed the Obama Administration's concessions on missile defense deployment in Poland and the Czech Republic, ignored the White House pleas for cooperation on Iran sanctions, and continued to pressure Georgia and Ukraine. Russia is also continuing its military modernization and establishing military bases from the Fergana Valley in Central Asia to the Black Sea.
At the same time, Moscow is a U.S. partner in arms control and resupplying U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. A senior Obama Administration official has characterized Russia as "neither friend nor foe" of the West,[3]while the United States and NATO are defined as principal adversaries in the Kremlin's national security documents.
Clearly, the type of economy and form of government that Russia assumes are strategic issues for the U.S. The Russian leadership is divided on these issues. The foreign and security policies arising from the current commodity-dependent export model, which is promulgated by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and First Deputy Premier Igor Sechin drastically differ from policies based on a knowledge-based, high-technology economy supported by President Dmitry Medvedev and economic reformers.
An economic model based on natural resources would tend to perpetuate authoritarianism, nationalism, and corruption, and it would require Russia to follow a neo-imperial policy throughout the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) to support Russian domination of the pipeline system. In a way, the petrostate model and the associated militarized foreign policy require Russia to label the U.S. as an enemy. A more open and diversified economy would be more compatible with democratization and the rule of law.
Russia's falling economic performance has dampened some aspects of the revisionist rhetoric, but has not drastically changed Russia's foreign policy narrative, which remains decidedly anti-status quo and implicitly anti-American. Recent increases in oil prices ensure the continuation of this policy. Even during the current crisis, Russia has continued to voice strong grievances against the West and made revisionist demands to change key international economic and European security institutions for its benefit.
Unless the Kremlin significantly reorients its foreign and security policy priorities, the Obama Administration's attempt to "reset" U.S.-Russian relations may fail. Only a coherent policy by the Obama Administration and Congress can force the Russian leadership to realize that they would be better served by cooperating with the U.S. and the West than by subverting it.
The Russian Petrostate Rollercoaster
In the 1990s, the Russian economy struggled with a difficult transition from central planning to a market economy under Boris Yeltsin. In the current decade, wealth from raw materials has fueled an increasingly revisionist foreign policy. Yet while the Russian elite views Russia as a great energy and military power, its economic productivity is only one-third of U.S. productivity,[4] and its gross domestic product (GDP) is between $1.1 trillion and $1.8 trillion, depending on oil prices, and is smaller than the GDPs of France, Italy, and the U.K.
From 2000 to 2008, the Kremlin benefited from rising oil prices. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's popularity soared as Russia entered a period of intense economic growth.
By 2008, Russia had become one of the 10 largest economies in the world. In only 10 years, its GDP had increased by more than eightfold (measured in U.S. dollars), having grown at an average annual rate of around 7 percent in constant rubles.[5] Real wages increased significantly, from $62 in 1999 to $529 in 2007.[6] Russia had the best stock market performance of any emerging markets during this time.[7]
This economic growth occurred despite the Kremlin's efforts, beginning in 2003, to renationalize much of Russia's natural resources and other strategic sectors of the economy. In 2003, the Kremlin took control of YUKOS, the largest publicly traded Russian oil company, and jailed its owner Mikhail Khodorkovsky. During Putin's second presidential term, the Kremlin's international rhetoric and actions became increasingly assertive, even aggressive.
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DTN News: Canada TODAY November 4, 2009 ~ French Armored vehicle In Canadian Forces Close Combat Vehicle (CCV) And Tactical Armored Patrol Vehicle (TAPV) Programs.
*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) - November 4, 2009: Nexter Systems, the French armored vehicle firm, has thrown its hat into the ring for both the Canadian Forces Close Combat Vehicle (CCV) and the Tactical Armored Patrol Vehicle (TAPV) programs.
Nexter is offering the Canadian Army its Aravis vehicle for the TAPV program and (as noted here before) the VBCI armored vehicles for CCV,
The Hagglund’s CV90 from BAE Systems is being offered for CCV. I still haven’t heard whether Rheinmetall will be taking part in CCV.
Nexter officials will highlight its industrial benefits package by offering assembly in Canada of the vehicles.
Nexter Communications Director Jerome Dufour has noted that the company responded to the letter of interest issued in September by the Canadian government.
The Aravis is 12 metric tonnes while the VBCI is 28-tonnes.
The VBCI in the infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) version would be offered to Canada equipped with a 25 mm canon.
According to Pierre Tran, my colleague at Defense News, the VBCI production line, relying heavily on subassembly “kits,” is designed to be easily set up for local assembly in foreign markets.
More from Defense News:
Nexter is in talks with Canadian companies to assure a local supply chain for domestic production of the VBCI and Aravis.
The French Army in April ordered 15 Aravis vehicles for reconnaissance by engineers on potentially mined routes in Afghanistan. The Aravis offers NATO Stanag 4 protection against ballistic, mines, artillery and IED threats, Nexter said.
Nexter is under pressure to boost exports as domestic orders are drying up. France has ordered a total 630 VBCIs for 2.86 billion euros, down from an initial planned 700 units.

DTN News: China TODAY November 4, 2009 ~ "August First" Aerobatics Team To Fly J-10 Fighter Planes*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) BEIJING, China - November 4, 2009: The reporters learned from relevant department of the Air Force of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) that the “August First” Aerobatics Team of the PLA Air Force which took the lead in flying over the Tian’anmen Square during an air show of the military parade in honor of the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China is to replace its demonstration aircraft with type J-10 fighter planes.A J-10 fighter plane lands at an airport in Beijing on Saturday as it practices for the 60th anniversary of the founding of Chinese Airforce which falls on November 11, 2009.
Independently developed and designed by China, the J-10 fighter planes of the aerobatics team will also adopt a new coating. This is the 4th time for the team to adopt a new coating for its demonstration aircraft since its establishment.
It’s introduced that the coated marks mainly include symbols of national flag, army emblem, aircraft emblem, words of "CHINA AIR FORCE", team emblem, aircraft number,flight formation, as well as the maintenance and warning marks.
The coating has distinct characteristics and “China Air Force” is the theme of the whole scheme. The national flag coated on the vertical tail, the words of “CHINA AIR FORCE” coated in the mid part of the aircraft body and the aircraft emblem coated on the aerofoil,all reflect the feature of PLA Air Force and have obvious representation.
The “arrow-shaped” pattern designed in combination with the aeronautic appearance and the “Flying” mark on the underside symbolize that the PLA Air Force is developing rapidly.
Blue, white and red colors are used in the coating with blue color as the main hue, for blue is the universal color adopted by most top aerobatic teams in the world. The coating well inherited the coating style of the type J-7EB/GB demonstration fighters with harmonious color which is concise, lively, solemn, artistic and easy to distinguish.

DTN News: Information Technology News TODAY November 4, 2009 ~ French Luxury Preens On Website In China*Source: DTN News / Int'l News
(NSI News Source Info) PARIS, France - November 4, 2009: France's creme de la creme luxury firms, hit by a drop in sales on traditional markets, launched a China charm offensive, with a 3D website that gives a peek at the best France has to offer.
Launched in Paris and Beijing by the Comite Colbert group of 70 luxury firms, the 250,000-euro ($516,000) website developed over two years (www.cColbert.fr) shows off top-end products as well as the best of the French lifestyle.
The launch came as consultants Bain et Company said luxury goods are expected to slump 16 percent this year on the US market, 10 percent in Japan and eight percent in Europe - but see a 12 percent hike in China.
"This is the first such internet site," said the Comite Colbert's Elisabeth Ponsolle des Portes. "3D previously was used for video and film but not on a website."
Users can watch a ballet performance, drool over patisseries, check out Paris hot spots and see the latest watches, perfumes and scarves.
"Luxury is not just about money but about culture and education," said the president of the Comite Colbert, Francoise Montenay.
"Products can be more or less expensive and you have to learn to distinguish between a very good product and a less good one."
Underlining the importance of the stakes, a number of leading luxury goods makers attended the launch of the site in Beijing, including Cartier, Hermes, Lanvin, Yves Delorme and Gien.
The website is hosted by China's biggest portal sina.com and will be available for six months.
In 2005, Comite Colbert companies registered 4.5 percent of their turnover in China, Hong Kong and Macau. That figure has gone up to eight percent on average, for some, up to 25 percent.
Over the last four years French luxury outlets in China have tripled to around 1,600, with 45 new boutiques due to be opened in 2009-2010, including 38 in mainland China.

DTN News: German Chancellor Angela Merkel Tells U.S. Congress Unacceptable For Iran To Have Nuclear Arms*Source: DTN News / Reuters
(NSI News Source Info) WASHINGTON, USA - November 4, 2009: German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Tuesday that Iran must be prevented from obtaining a nuclear weapon and that the country must be shown that the West has zero tolerance on the matter.German Chancellor Angela Merkel addresses a joint session of Congress as U.S. Vice President Joe Biden (L) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi listen on Capitol Hill in Washington, November 3, 2009. Merkel, who began her second term in office last week, is the first German leader to address the U.S. Congress since Konrad Adenauer in 1957.
"Zero tolerance needs to be shown when there is a risk of weapons of mass destruction falling, for example, into the hands of Iran and threatening our security," Merkel said in translated remarks to a joint meeting of the U.S. Congress.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel smiles as she arrives to address a joint session of Congress on Capitol Hill in Washington, November 3, 2009. (REUTERS/Jason Reed)
"Iran needs to be aware of this, Iran knows our offer but Iran also knows where we draw a line," Merkel said.
Tehran and Washington have been at odds for years over Iran's nuclear program which Western powers fear is a covert effort to develop nuclear weapons. Iran has denies that and says it needs nuclear technology to generate electricity.
Western powers have urged Iran to accept a draft deal in which it would send most of its low-enriched uranium abroad by the end of the year for further enrichment to turn it into fuel for a medical reactor in Tehran.
However, on Monday an Iranian diplomat said additional talks were needed on the U.N.-drafted nuclear deal and that Tehran wants to import atomic fuel rather than send its own uranium abroad for processing.
"A nuclear bomb in the hands of an Iranian president who denies the Holocaust, threatens Israel and denies Israel the right to exist is not acceptable," Merkel said, referring to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

DTN News: South Korea To Seek Chinese help To Track Cyber Attacks*Source: DTN News / Int'l Media
(NSI News Source Info) SEOUL, South Korea - November 4, 2009: South Korean police said Monday they would request help from China to track the origins of cyber attacks that briefly crippled US and South Korean government and commercial websites in July.
"We are now seeking help from Chinese authorities to launch a joint investigation," a national police agency official told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The move follows last week's remarks by South Korea's intelligence service chief Won Sei-Hoon blaming North Korea's telecommunications ministry for the attacks.
"Our search into the route of the attacks on South Korean and US sites found a line coming from China," Won told a parliamentary session last Thursday, Yonhap news agency and local newspapers reported at the time.
"The line was found to be on the IP (Internet protocol) that the North Korean Ministry of Post and Telecommunications is using on rent (from China)," Won said.
It was the first time the South's National Intelligence Service had named a specific body as the user of the IP address linked to the attacks.
The intelligence agency had said in July that North Korea was a prime suspect in the "distributed denial of service" attacks designed to swamp selected websites with traffic.
The attackers infected tens of thousands of "zombie" computers with a virus which programmed them to send a flood of requests for website access.
But the origin of the attacks was never confirmed, with one Vietnamese expert saying they originated from a master server in Britain. Experts say North Korea maintains elite hacker units.
The threat of cyber warfare by its neighbour has prompted South Korea to establish a specific military command, which will be active by next year. Last week Lieutenant General Jeffrey Remington, commander of the US Air Force in South Korea, called on Washington and Seoul to take "aggressive steps" to safeguard their military computer networks from increasingly sophisticated cyber attacks.

DTN News: KMW's Leopard 1A5 Main Battle Tank Delivery Of First Of Brazilian Army*By 2012, a total of 220 systems held by the Federal Armed Forces will be delivered to Brazil
*KMW is repaired and the vehicles in Germany takes over the on-site service
*Source: DTN News / Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW)
(NSI News Source Info) KASSEL, Germany - November 4, 2009: Krauss-Maffei Wegmann (KMW), on Wednesday, 28 October 2009, the first of 220 Leopard 1A5 main battle tanks of the type at the site of Kassel, Germany handed over to the Brazilian army. The tanks come from portfolio holdings of the Federal Armed Forces since the beginning of this year and will be repaired by KMW set modernized. The delivery of all systems is planned by 2012. The Leopard 1 was first produced in 1963 by Krauss-Maffei for the German Ministry of Defence and more than 6,000 vehicles have been exported to Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Italy, Canada, the Netherlands, Norway, Turkey and Australia.
Brazil has agreed to the purchase of battle tanks under a government business with the Federal Republic of Germany. The Federal Office of Defense Technology and Procurement (Koblenz) has asked again KMW late December 2008 as a general inter alia, the maintenance, construction status and the development and adaptation of specific Mustereinrüstung Brazilian subsystems. In addition, the package looks at the South American customers include training devices, simulators, Drivers Instruction Vehicle and technical assistance on the spot.
The Leopard 1 was introduced in 1965 in the Bundeswehr. In 2003, the last battle tanks of this type in Germany has been decommissioned. The system is accordingly at liberty in its class even today as a technology leader. There have been several upgrades of and including the service of the armed forces of Belgium, Chile, Greece, Italy and Turkey.

DTN News: Lockheed Martin-Built GPS Satellite Achieves 10 Years Of On-Orbit Operations
*Next-Generation System Progressing On-schedule in Critical Design Review Phase*Source: DTN News / Lockheed Martin
(NSI News Source Info) NEWTOWN, Pa, - November 3, 2009: The third Global Positioning System Block IIR (GPS IIR-3) satellite, designed and built by Lockheed Martin [NYSE: LMT] to provide significantly improved navigation capabilities for military and civilian users worldwide, has reached 10 years of successful on-orbit operational service.Global Positioning System (GPS)
FROM IMPROVED ACCURACY TO KNOWING EXACTLY WHERE YOU STAND, THERE IS ONE IMPORTANT WORD: HOW.
On May 15, 2008,the U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles Air Force Base, Calif. awarded a team led by Lockheed Martin a $1.46 billion contract to build the next-generation Global Positioning System Space System program, known as GPS III.
This program will improve position, navigation, and timing services for the warfighter and civil users worldwide and provide advanced anti-jam capabilities yielding superior system security, accuracy and reliability.
Under the Development and Production contract, the team of Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, ITT Corporation, and General Dynamics, will produce the first two GPS IIIA satellites with the first launch projected for 2014. The contract also includes options for up to 10 additional spacecraft.
Eight GPS IIIB and 16 GPS IIIC satellites are planned for later increments, with each increment including additional capabilities based on technical maturity. When fully deployed, the GPS III constellation will feature a cross-linked command and control architecture, allowing the entire GPS constellation to be updated simultaneously from a single ground station. Additionally, a new spot beam capability for enhanced military (M-Code) coverage and increased resistance to hostile jamming will be incorporated. These enhancements will contribute to improved accuracy and assured availability for military and civilian users worldwide.
For GPS III, Lockheed Martin will build on its proven record of providing progressively advanced spacecraft for the current GPS constellation: the team designed and built 21 GPS IIR satellites for the Air Force and subsequently modernized eight of those spacecraft, designated GPS IIR-M, to enhance operations and navigation signal performance.
The Global Positioning System enables properly equipped users to determine precise time and velocity and worldwide latitude, longitude and altitude to within a few meters. Air Force Space Command's 2nd Space Operations Squadron (2SOPS), based at Schriever Air Force Base, Colo., manages and operates the GPS constellation for both civil and military users.
The satellite was launched on Oct. 7, 1999, and is one of 30 GPS spacecraft currently on-orbit, providing critical situational awareness and precision weapon guidance for the military. The constellation also supports a wide range of civil, scientific and commercial functions – including air traffic control, ATM banking, and the Internet.
As the prime contractor for the GPS IIR program, Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Newtown, Pa., designed and built 21 IIR spacecraft for the Global Positioning Systems Wing, Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles Air Force Base, Calif. The final eight spacecraft, designated Block IIR-M, were modernized to enhance operations and navigation signal performance for military and civilian GPS users around the globe. The current fleet of Block IIR and IIR-M satellites within the overall GPS constellation has reached over 100 cumulative operational years on-orbit.
“This milestone is a testament to the outstanding efforts our industry-government team has dedicated to this critical program over the past decade,” said Don DeGryse, Lockheed Martin's vice president of Navigation Systems. “We are incredibly pleased with this impressive record of performance and longevity as we continue our mission to provide superior capabilities to the warfighter as well as millions of civil users around the globe.”
The U.S. Air Force's next-generation GPS spacecraft, known as GPS III, being built by a Lockheed Martin-led team that includes industry partners ITT of Clifton, N.J. and General Dynamics of Gilbert, Ariz., is proceeding on-schedule in the Critical Design Review (CDR) phase of the program.
GPS III will improve position, navigation and timing services and provide advanced anti-jam capabilities yielding superior system security, accuracy and reliability. The next generation GPS IIIA satellites will deliver significant improvements over current GPS space vehicles, including a new international civil signal (L1C) and increased M-Code anti-jam power with full earth coverage for military users.
The team is in the process of executing 70 individual CDRs for all GPS III Space Vehicle subsystems, assemblies and elements.
The review phase will culminate in the third quarter of 2010 with a final Space Vehicle CDR that will validate the detailed GPS III design to ensure it meets warfighter and civil requirements. The team is on track to launch the first GPS IIIA satellite in 2014.
Headquartered in Bethesda, Md., Lockheed Martin is a global security company that employs about 140,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services. The corporation reported 2008 sales of $42.7 billion.
Media Contacts: Steve Tatum, 408-742-7531; e-mail, Stephen.o.tatum@lmco.com
Samantha Un, 408-742-3516; e-mail, Samantha.Un@lmco.comLockheed Martin Related News....for full stories click on the links below~ November 02, 2009 U.S. Navy Awards Lockheed Martin Nearly $10 Million to Design New Surface Ship Electronic Warfare System
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DTN News: Russia ~ Next Bulava Missile Test-Launch Slated For Nov. 24*Source: DTN News / RIA Novosti
(NSI News Source Info) MOSCOW, Russia - November 3, 2009: Russia's troubled Bulava submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) will be test-fired on November 24, a defense industry source said on Monday.
He said the submarine would be launched from the Dmitry Donskoi nuclear-powered submarine in the North Sea.
The Typhoon-class submarine, based at a naval facility in northern Russia's Severodvinsk, is the only vessel in service with the Russian Navy capable of testing the new missile.
The Bulava was last test-fired from the Dmitry Donskoi in the North Sea on July 15, but self-destructed soon after launch due to a defective steering system in its first stage.
The Russian military expects the Bulava, along with Topol-M land-based ballistic missiles, to become the core of Russia's nuclear triad.
However, the Bulava's development has been dogged by a series of setbacks, which has officially suffered six failures in 11 tests.
But some analysts suggest that in reality the number of failures has been considerably greater. According to Russian military expert Pavel Felgenhauer, of the Bulava's 11 test launches, only one was entirely successful.
The future development of the Bulava has been questioned by some lawmakers and defense industry officials, who have suggested that all efforts should be focused on the existing Sineva SLBM.
But the Russian military has insisted that there is no alternative to the Bulava and pledged to continue testing the missile until it is ready to be put in service with the Navy.
The Bulava (SS-NX-30) SLBM carries up to 10 MIRV warheads and has a range of over 8,000 kilometers (5,000 miles).